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Yesterday, 3.5 miles.

I'm getting used to the hills but the brick sidewalks are a new item on the menu. And the dogs! Maybe over time I will get used to them, and vice versa, but it hasn't been a good scene so far. I don't count how many dogs we hear, I don't know what my threshold is, but after so many, it becomes just too much unnecessary adrenal stimulation. I want to save that for dogs that are loose.

Today, 3ish miles.

Night and day, literally! For some reason, I woke up at 5:39 am despite having problems sleeping again (maybe I'm now used to ~4-5 hours of sleep per night?). There has been a lot on my mind particularly the washer which I discovered yesterday does not drain; today, I'm waiting for a phone call from a repair person which will determine the fate of a garbage bag of wet laundry: laundromat, or wait? There is an intermediary insurance company and I don't have the contact info of the actual repairperson, just an assurance that they're going to phone today. In general, moving in this time has been subject to a bunch of little unforeseeable delays that are creeping up and, like so many barking dogs, clawing under my skin. The previous tenants caused some damage, we knew this going in, and the landlord has been honest and has gotten repair people lined up, but hidden issues are surprising us all. Once this is all behind us, living here will be nice.

At any rate, I woke up at 5:39 and it was on. I thought about slipping back into sleep because it was still dark and I had no reason to get up that early, but it was on. Going out to run seemed like the only option. This happens very occasionally and it never disappoints. I thought it might be hard to get the dog up (he's not an early riser either) but he was up and out of his bed before I had to ask. It was on for him too. We started shortly before six.

We jogged a different way. My last runs have been mostly East-West, but it seems that the major streets are North-South, so I decided to go South on a more consistent sidewalk. At this hour in the morning, we could run on the road on the quieter streets and probably I'll do this for future runs, but this time I wanted to see more of the town anyway and I wasn't sure if there would be traffic and I'd be stuck tripping over heaved brick/concrete/grass/tree roots.

The first and only person we saw, a few minutes into the run, was another runner. We didn't see a car being driven until five or so minutes after that. It was quiet for a while, no birds, nothing. We passed mostly businesses for the first bit and nothing was open or moving, and there were more street lamps than I was expecting. It was pretty comfortable. Then we crossed a creek and it became more residential, no street lamps, and funky sidewalks. A bit of concrete, a bit of brick (both sometimes badly heaved and cracked), and then grass. I think I will learn something from running on uneven surfaces in the dark: it does force me to be lighter on my feet. Fortunately, there was still almost no traffic so we ran on the street when it got too rough. I misremembered street names again but since the general format is a grid; we were never actually lost, just kind of bemused. It was too dark to read the street signs without getting really close to them so it took me a few blocks to realize that I'd gotten past the streets I would have been able to recognize.

There were still barking dogs, but the two that were barking outside were quickly shushed and brought back in. The other barking dogs, I didn't count how many, were inside and the noise was muffled. Didn't bother us at all! Problem solved, or passed onto the people who should be working on it.

Yes, a barking dog is a good deterrent, but it must be honed. My dog is much more of a guard dog than I'd expected or wanted; there are drawbacks to this and I don't think I'll adopt another adolescent shelter dog with a murky history, but I appreciate his artistry. When we move into a new place, I have to tell him what not to bark at, mainly everybody not on the property and the mail person and other frequent legit visitors, but after a week or so, he learns and understands. Due to past abuse (he was a rescued dog) and/or temperament, he is not social with visitors, but he will go to his crate and lie there quietly when we tell him to do so and eventually he recognizes the frequent callers and reserves his best work for the unknown. I once, only once, entered our old house through the back and he didn't see it was me at first; I heard a soft bark when I opened the gate and then, when I stepped on the back deck and saw the back door, I experienced the darkest deepest abyss of the afterworld rumbling past a gleaming portcullis of fangs--just for a fraction of a moment before he recognized me and turned into the usual wriggle. Very few people are privy to the greeting dance of the One Veil: he usually grabs his blanket and shakes his hind end fast enough to blur. It's a very special time. Once I clipped a pedometer on his collar when he was in mid-dance and it registered 127 steps/20 seconds (disclaimer: it wasn't calibrated for dogs).

I would like to do a longer run this evening, circumstances and laundry permitting.